Mirai — a notorious malware that’s been enslaving IoT devices — has competition.
A rival piece of programming has been infecting some of the same easy-to-hack internet-of-things products, with a resiliency that surpasses Mirai, according to security researchers.
“You can almost call it Mirai on steroids,” said Marshal Webb, CTO at BackConnect, a provider of services to protect against distributed denial-of-service (DDoS)Â attacks.
Security researchers have dubbed the rival IoT malware Hajime, and since it was discovered more than six months ago, it’s been spreading unabated and creating a botnet. Webb estimates it’s infected about 100,000 devices across the globe.
These botnets, or networks of enslaved computers, can be problematic. They’re often used to launch massive DDoS attacks that can take down websites or even disrupt the internet’s infrastructure.
